Wings of Fire Part 3

Holly Black was born in New Jersey, married her high school sweetheart and nearly got a degree in library science from Rutgers before her first book tour interrupted her studies. She is the author of the bestselling The Spiderwick Chronicles, which was made into a feature film released in 2008. Her first story appeared in 1997, but she first got attention with her debut novel, t.i.the: A Modern Faerie Tale. She has written eleven Spiderwick books and three novels in the Modern Faerie Tale sequence, including Andre Norton Award winner Valiant: A Modern Tale of Faerie. Black's most recent books are her first short story collection, The Poison Eaters and Others, and White Cat, the first novel in her new Curse Worker series. She was nominated for an Eisner Award for graphic novel series, The Good Neighbors, and recently co-edited anthology Zombies vs. Unicorns with Justine Larbalestier.

Mom had always been a little off, so I figured if she wanted to be high priestess of a cult made up of three people, then whatever. It seemed harmless. Besides, I thought it would help her get over getting fired from the superstore. Maybe even distract her from thinking about Hank, the stock guy that she talked about all the time.

Even though Mom worked mostly at the checkout counter and he was in the back, they met for lunch. Hank. At first I thought that he was the one that put the ideas in her head about Sobek the Destroyer and the no-souls, because he was at the center of most of her fantasies. She told me Hank was "born into many bodies," whatever that means. I just figured he was trying to get in her pants with some metaphysical bulls.h.i.t.

I found out later that Hank was happily married with three kids. After Mom lost her job, she took me to the superstore with her--to buy milk, eggs and toilet paper, she'd said--then slipped into the back. I followed her.

Hank was a tall, gaunt guy with big gla.s.ses. Those gla.s.ses made his eyes look big, but when Mom came in, his eyes got even bigger.

"It was the no-souls," she said. "You know how they are, always talking. It was a no-soul conspiracy that got me fired."

He looked puzzled. "I don't think that it was anybody's--"

"You know it was the no-souls. You know! Did they get to you too? Does that mean you're not going to help me, Hank?"

"That's not what I'm saying." You could hear the fear in his voice. It suddenly occurred to me that they weren't meeting for lunch, she was cornering him during lunch to preach all this stuff.

Now, I kind of think it was the firing that really sent her over the edge. Before that she'd had some wacky beliefs and maybe sometimes they slipped over into real life, but without the superstore it was all Sobek all the time.

She made a shrine to him in the corner of our apartment, buying plastic alligators and gluing plastic gems to their backs or painting their tails with gold. One night I looked through her books and realized what Sobek was. A demon crocodile, worshipped in Egypt. Some old myth.

"I've seen him," she told me. "In the sewers."

"Mom, he's a crocodile G.o.d," I said. "It's alligators that live in the sewers. And it's an urban legend." She'd taken to drawing black lines around her eyes so that she looked more like an Egyptian priestess. I thought she just looked like an old goth.

"Amaya, you should pray to him. He's trying to take the evil out of the world, but his power comes from our prayers."

"Okay," I said. When she was like this, you just had to go along with her.

Just like I went along with her when she kept me out of school for two weeks because she was afraid to be alone. Or how she told me that one of my friends, Lydia, was some kind of monstrous no-soul person. Mom would scream and chant when Lydia came over. That sucked, but I went along with it and never brought her by. It wasn't like I liked having people over anyway.

Even without Mom's job, we were mostly okay. Dad, an engineer so rational that metaphors annoyed him, paid his alimony and child support exactly on time every month--enough to cover the rent, utilities and food if we were careful. Looking back, I almost wish that we hadn't had enough money. Maybe then she would have had a reason to try and hold it together.

"I've worked since I was younger than you," she would say. "I deserve a break."

I thought maybe she was right. Maybe she could burn this out of her system like she'd burned through a bunch of other obsessions. Like when she said that she was a reincarnation of someone my father had killed in a past life and kept calling him and shouting "murderer" over the phone until my stepmother reportedly pulled the cord out of the wall.

But hanging around the house, she met Miranda and her boyfriend, Paulo. Miranda was the super's niece, so they lived in an apartment for free. Paulo used to walk dogs for people, but one of them had gotten away and there was some kind of legal thing going on with the owners that I never really understood. I think they were suing him, but what they hoped to get out of it, I have no idea. Anyway, Miranda and Paulo seemed to spend most of their time sitting on the front stoop, smoking unfiltered cigarettes. Sometimes Miranda cadged money out of one of her relatives.

They got way into Sobek.

To Miranda, Sobek was going to change her fortunes and show all her sisters and brothers who called her lazy that she was just different. Special. Destined for glorious things they would never understand.

To Paulo, Sobek was a warrior-G.o.d who swept enemies out of the path of his followers. To hear Paulo talk, there were a lot of enemies in need of sweeping. He was the one that changed the sobriquet from Sobek the Repairer to Rager, although it never really caught on.

Somewhere along the way, Mom decided that Paulo was Hank--that Paulo was another one of the bodies that Hank's soul had been born into. Miranda probably wasn't too happy about that.

But their favorite activity was talking about the no-souls. No-souls look like people, but they're rotten on the inside. And they control everything. No-souls are the reason things are so screwed up in the world. Mom and Miranda and Paulo loved naming people they knew who were probably no-souls. It was their favorite thing.

Paulo and Miranda started calling our apartment building Arsinoe, after a town that Sobek was really fond of, but after a while they forgot that and just started calling the place Crocodopolis. I called it that too, because it made me laugh.

Look, I didn't know that this is how these things start. They don't warn you in school and I guess didn't watch the right kind of television. Even the fact that I was nervous most of the time--scared of the way they were acting, scared of how quickly my mother got angry--didn't tip me off.

After Mom and Paulo and Miranda filled the whole place with glittery, adorned plastic alligators and nothing happened, they started looking for Sobek. First they went back to the place where Mom said she'd seen him in a grate. The manhole was impossible to pry up, but they would throw strips of bacon down into the darkness.

Then, somehow, Paulo bought a manhole cover removal tool off of craigslist and they were wading around in the shallow water, making their devotions. Most of the time they came back defeated and dirty, but once or twice they claimed to have seen a tail or something.

My mother was always the one that saw him and soon he started talking to her. Visiting her. Slinking into her bedroom when she was alone at night. Demanding that Miranda and Paulo prove their loyalty.

She had scratches all over her body in the morning, long and dark, like some kind of claws sc.r.a.ped over her soft flesh. Holy scars to mark a priestess.

I wondered how she faked them. I knew why, even if she didn't. She was afraid of losing her disciples. I guess it was just a matter of time before they stepped up their game and decided that they needed to give Sobek something in order to get something. A sacrifice. Me.

They had lots of reasons. For one thing, I was in the way. I cost money to feed. Plus, I made fun of them. When my best friend Shana came over, we would look through their notebooks and laugh so hard that we were in serious danger of peeing our pants. They would make up prayers like, "Sobek, whose sweat became the Nile, let this lottery ticket drenched in our sweat bring us enough cash to venerate you properly."

I think it bothered them that I could tell there was some s.e.xual tension bound up in all this praying. They closed the door to the living room to finish their rituals and came out sweaty and half-dressed. I knew it bothered Paulo and Miranda to look me in the face afterward. So they didn't like me. And having a kid around made my mom seem too ordinary to be a prophet.

But the last reason is the reason I hate the most, even if it is true. They took me because I was the only one dumb enough and trusting enough to go down into the sewer with them.

I was afraid of them, sometimes, when they got really weird. But I wasn't afraid enough. I thought that if I kept going along with things, they'd get better. My mother was slipping into some other reality from which I had no idea how to get her back, so my plan was to wait it out. When they told me to pray to Sobek, I prayed. When they told me that soon everything would be different and they would be rewarded, I nodded. Mostly, the results of going along with things were just boring.

"You go on down this time with your Mom," Paulo said, once he'd removed the manhole cover. "I'll look out for the cops."

"It looks dark." I could just see the glint of ripples of water moving many feet below where I stood.

I'd always been the one to watch for cops when they went into the sewers. I would stand in the mouth of the alley, looking down at the shine of the streetlights on the murky water and then back toward traffic. Sometimes I would stare down the manhole for so long that my mind would get occupied with thoughts of other things--school and friends and plans for how I could maybe someday make it to college and from there to engineering school--and my eyes would play tricks on me. Once I thought I saw a tail dragging through the water. Another time I thought there was a flash of golden eyes the size of tennis b.a.l.l.s. I nearly shouted for my mother, but by the time I opened my mouth, whatever trick of the light that messed with my vision was gone.

Either way, I was pretty sure I didn't want to go down there.

"I'm good," I told Paulo. "I don't mind watching for the cops. I don't get bored."

My mother laughed and kissed me on the forehead. "That's right. Only boring people get bored." It was one of her favorite sayings.

Paulo put his hand over his stomach. "I don't feel good, Amaya. Go on with your mother and Miranda this time. Maybe you'll have more luck than us. You've got young eyes."

"No way," I said. "This is your thing. I'm just here to help."

"Just take a quick look around and you can come right up if you don't like it," Mom said. "You don't have to even get off the ladder."

That filled me with so much relief that I did it. Gingerly, I got down on my hands and knees on the asphalt and slipped one sneakered foot onto whatever rung it reached. The metal felt slippery and I hesitated before I grabbed the first rung and started climbing down. The air was hot with decomposition and smelled rancidly sweet.

"We know why we can't see him, Amaya," said my mom. Gold-toned bracelets jangled on her wrists. "He needs a virgin."

Miranda leaned down and stroked my hair back from my face. "You are a virgin, aren't you?"

I pulled away from her the only way I could, stepping down several more rungs. "Don't be so gross," I said.

There was a heavy clank and darkness. I screamed, really screamed, so hard that my throat hurt.

"Shhhhh, my mother called from the grate. "Wait for your eyes to adjust."

I blinked a few times and could only see a vague light making the walls glisten. My hands hurt where I was holding on to the bar.

"Open it," I yelled. "I want to come up. I don't like it down here."

"Just look around," Miranda said. "Do you see anything? Is he down there?"

I started thinking fast. Would they be mad if I went down there and didn't see anything? They were going to make me wait for a while unless I saw something. So, the sooner the better, right? But if I said something right away, they might suspect I was lying.

"I can't see," I said, finally. "Maybe if you took off the cover again, I'd do better?"

"We don't know if Sobek likes light," Paulo said. His voice sounded strained, weird.

"Sobek is supposed to be a G.o.d. You think he's afraid of sunlight?"

"It might not be Sobek," Miranda said. "Your mother's visions hint that it may be one of his sacred crocodiles. One that's still growing."

"Honey, we're going to leave you alone now," Mom said. She sounded just like a concerned mother should sound, except she wasn't. "We'll come back tomorrow and you can tell us what you saw. You're going to meet a G.o.d, baby. You're so lucky."

Cold terror knotted my stomach. I shouted and begged and threatened, but no one said anything else to me and finally I realized I was alone. They'd gone and my only hope was that they really would come back tomorrow.

By then my hands were cramped so badly from gripping the metal bar that I was afraid they wouldn't hold anything else. I took an unsteady step down, slid my shaking hand onto the next rung. Then, I put my left foot wrong and my hold wasn't nearly good enough to keep me on the ladder.

I fell into the wet, stinking refuse. The breath was knocked out of me. My knees pulsed with pain and my hands felt sc.r.a.ped raw.

In the darkness, something moved, sounding like the sc.r.a.pe of claws along the walls. The water rippled.

Sobek the Destroyer. He didn't seem so funny now.

I scrambled to my feet and started on a stumbling run, hands in front of me. I ran and ran, my heartbeat sounding like footsteps behind me, until the pa.s.sageway curved and I had to stop long enough to figure out where to go next. I leaned against a slimy wall and realized that I was being silly.

There were no alligators in this sewer. What I'd heard were probably rats. Or, like, a billion c.o.c.kroaches.

I shook my head and pressed my fingers to my eyes. Then I told myself--out loud--there was no crocodile G.o.d.

"Sobek isn't real," I said. "He's like Santa Claus. He's like the closet monster."

I waited a long moment, to hear if blasphemy got me struck down, but nothing happened. I let out my breath.

I had to find a dry place--or at least a less disgusting place--to wait out the night. There was no way to tell time--my watch didn't glow or anything--but morning would come eventually. Then Mom would let me out and I would never, ever trust any of them again.

That started me shuffling again, trying to discern if the waterline rose or fell and feeling along the disgusting walls for some kind of ridge or ramp. If I could just find a place to hole up until then, I'd be fine. Cold and sc.r.a.ped up and totally covered in grossness, but fine.

Then I thought about what my mother and Miranda said about me before they shoved me in the hole. That whole weird thing about me being a virgin. There's only one thing I could think of that you did with virgins in ceremonies--sacrifice them.

My heart started beating as fast as when I was running, so fast that my hand automatically went to my chest, like I could stop my heart from leaping out of my skin.

My mother might not be coming back. She might have dropped me down here to die.

The more I thought about it, the more scared I got, because even if she came back, she really might not let me out of here.

The thing about living with my Mom is that I knew there was a rational, calculating part of her. A part that knew she'd get in trouble for locking her underage daughter in a sewer overnight and that my not being around to tell anyone was her best chance of making it seem like she did nothing wrong.

So I figured that if she did come tomorrow, she'd ask me if Sobek spoke to me. No answer would be the right one. If I said I saw Sobek, she'd send me back to give him another message. If I said I didn't, she'd say I just needed more time.

I'm never getting out of here.

The thought sunk into me like the filthy water seeped into my clothes. I tried to shake it off, to tell myself that there had to be other ways out, but it was hard as I moved deeper and deeper into the tunnels. Hard as my legs ached with the strain of moving through water. Each step made my muscles burn. My sneakers were soaked and heavy with mud, my socks swollen with it.

I kept going, walking for what felt like miles.

My fingers finally brushed the edge of a wide pipe halfway up the wall. It seemed dry inside. If I could get up there, then I could at least rest for a little while.

It took me three tries, leaping up and trying to brace my stomach on the edge like it was a balance beam, then scrabbling with my fingers. On my second try, I fell, knocking my jaw against the metal and falling on my a.s.s in the water. For a moment, I thought I would just start sobbing.

The third try landed me on my belly in the pipe. I heard an echo of my thump down the metal and then the sound of scrabbling claws. Rats, I told myself. I was too tired to care. It wasn't wet or covered in foulness. For right then, I didn't have to move. Leaning my head against the curve of the pipe I closed my eyes.

I thought I would just rest for a moment, but despite my surroundings I fell asleep. I must have been exhausted.

My dreams were restless. In one, I saw this guy I liked who sat near me in English cla.s.s. He was standing over a grate, looking down at me. I was flushed, but really pretty. Like Sleeping Beauty.

He spat on me.

I jerked my head, knocking my cheek against the curved side of the pipe. I woke to the reek of rot and with it, the realization of where I was.

I was shaking with chills, even though I remembered the tunnels as being warm.

You have a fever, I told myself. Was I getting sick? It was hard to concentrate. My mind was racing--flitting from imagining I was in my own bed to slipping into another dream of claws and something huge crawling toward me down the tunnel in the dark.

I heard a long hiss.

I jumped in terror. My sneakers squeaked against metal as I tried to climb backward.

"Sobek?" I whispered. My mouth began to move over the words of stupid sweat prayer automatically.

I felt the weight of body, scaled and warm, as though live coals burned within it, against my shoulder. A long tongue pushed at my hair. Alligators don't have tongues like that. Neither do crocodiles.

I thought of all the cuts I'd gotten falling off the metal railing and all the filthy water I'd waded through. I was sure the cuts were infected. I was feverish. Dreaming.

I held as still as I could, shivering with cold and terror as the long body slid over mine, claws digging lightly into my skin, tail dragging behind it. Then it was gone and my relief was so profound that it wore me out.

When I woke up, there was a soft light coming through a grating far above me, too far to hope that if I screamed, I'd be heard. Occasionally a shadow strobed past, in a way that I thought might suggest traffic.

Sweat slicked my face and plastered curls of my damp hair to my skin. The fever must have broken while I slept.

Crazy is hereditary. Everyone knows that. Whatever made my mother the way she was also must be crawling around in my brain, just waiting for the chance to bloom like mold.